Desert Air - 30. DA Ch 30 - Stranded

I must have fallen asleep, as the Sat phone ringing woke me up and I jumped up to answer it. “Hello, Jexon speaking,” I said, “Mr Kendrik, This is Ted, I am sorry, but you are going to have to rough it on the island for tonight, as the storm wont be clearing until just before day break,” the Pilot informed me.

“That will be fine, I still have a little bit of soup, a sandwich, fruit and water with me, plus I have a heavy jacket on, so I will stay dry and I have found some shelter out of the wind and rain,” I responded, not telling him the real truth of where I am. “Very well then, I will collect you at 8 am, see you then, bye,” Ted said before ending the call, and I just smiled.

Stoking up the fire to get it going properly again, I noticed that it was almost dark outside, and I went to the kitchen and ate the last of my soup, and the last sandwich, with the snack bars and fruit to be my breakfast in the morning.

From the window, I could see the flash of the lights coming from the lighthouse, and I watched it for a while before laying back down on the lounge and watching the flames dancing around in the fireplace.

When I woke in the morning, I could see clear skies and it was looking like a nice day, as I sat up and stretched before standing and going outside to have a look around. A few minutes later I headed back inside and I ate my breakfast of snack bars, and fruit, once I was done, I cleaned up the fireplace to remove all ash and charcoal.

Once I was happy that the house back the way I found it, I headed back to the lighthouse, to await the helicopter ride back to the mainland, leaving my empty esky and thermos in the house, to use when I return with the expedition.

Once I was back at Anzac Park, I thanked Ted for his transport service and I walked back to the motel, to have a shower and change into some fresh clothes, before I loaded all the photos that I had taken onto my laptop, and I edited out the ones that were blurry or didn’t look good.

Once that was done I made a call to change my flight from the later afternoon to the early afternoon flight, leaving at 1 pm, as I had achieved what I wanted and needed to get back to the university and relax a little before my first lecture tomorrow morning, and while waiting for the flight at the airport, I made a phone call home to Dad, to discuss another matter regarding the island.

When I arrived at my accommodation, I found an envelope had been slipped under the door of my room, so I opened it. “Dear Research Expedition member, there will be a meeting of all members of the expedition, to be held in the main auditorium to be held at 7 pm this Monday evening. Make sure that you attend, as there will be important information discussed, and anyone who doesn’t attend without prior notification, will be stricken from the list of attending the expedition.”

I made sure to add the event to my calendar on my phone, before sitting down and doing some reading until it was time to go and eat. The following day was a normal day of attending lectures and spending some time at the Vet hospital, and I finished my work there shortly before 6 pm, which left me very little time to have a meal and get to the auditorium to attend the meeting.

“Good Evening. Thank you all for attending tonight. We have less than two weeks before we will be setting off on our little adventure to Eclipse Island, which is 6 kilometres off the Great Southern coast, near Albany.

The first thing I want to let you know is that we are very lucky that we will be not roughing it as badly as we had originally thought. Thanks to a kind benefactor, the Islands main buildings have had some restoration work done, and it now has power and lighting, in the main accommodation house that we will be staying in.

As you can see, we are quite a large group, 16 in total, four staff and twelve students from different disciplines of science. The accommodation has a total of six bedrooms, so there will be three students per bedroom, and two staff for the remaining two bedrooms.

You will be required to bring with you enough clothes for one week, and you will have to do manual washing, as there is no washing machine on the island. Your beds are to be a single swag or air mattress and sleeping bag, and we will be sharing cooking and cleaning duties, with Dr De Souza being in charge of meal planning and supplies.

Our days on the island will begin with breakfast at 7 am, followed by a morning briefing that will last half an hour, before we split into our groups and start our research work. There are two students who will be working in two fields as they are doing double degrees. Mr Kendrik is our only Veterinary Science student, who is also doing Zoology, while Ms Dennison is doing Marine Biology and Zoology.

Those who are doing Environmental Science will be with Dr Julia Lane, I will be heading Zoology, Associate Professor Patricia Flank will be heading the Marine Biology and Dr Anton De Souza will be assisting where needed. Any questions so far?” our expedition Leader and my Zoology Lecturer, Associate Professor Michael Quinn announced.

“Yes sir, how are we getting to Albany and onto the island?” one student asked, “We have chartered a bus for our trip down and back, which is a 5 hour journey each way, and we will have one stop for a short comfort break, departing from the university at 8 am.

Anyone who misses the bus will have to either get to Albany before the bus gets there or miss out all together. Now in regards to getting to the island, that is where the adventure begins. We will be taking a cruise on a 20 metre fishing boat from Emu Point that will take us to the island, where we will zip line to the island, as there is no safe mooring on the island,” the Professor announced.

When I heard groans and gasps from my fellow students, I smiled, knowing what I had arranged with Dad, which hope would be completed and installed before the expedition begins. “What are you grinning at? Looks like you are going to enjoy the zip line experience,” my class mate and friend - August Hunter said to me.

“Yes you could say that, I am really looking forward to this,” I replied. After about twenty more minutes of information and questions, we were allowed to leave and Auggie as I call my friend pulled me to one side, “Can we share a room, I don’t really know any other classmates very well,” he asked me.

“Sure mate, that is not a problem, I will catch you at the next lecture tomorrow,” I replied before saying good night, as Auggie lived in a suburb not too far away from the university, so he gets to go home every day.

Meanwhile down south in Albany, an engineering company had just received to final measurements for a steel gantry platform, that will fit between the space, in the rocks directly below the main house on Eclipse Island, and will be bolted at each end, plus support brackets along the side wall, to prevent any wobbling.

The platform, will be ten metres wide, and will be located 3 metres above sea level at high tide, with mooring bollards along the side, to securing boats, and a number of ladders and rubber tyres to soften the impact of boats against the platform when the waves are rough.

From the platform, there will be a cage supply lift, to bring supplies to the top of the island 9 metres above, while stairs provide pedestrian access to get to the top. Dad was asking the engineering company to try and get the job built and installed before the holidays begin, and I was hoping that it will be completed then too, as it will make it a lot easier to get up onto the island.

Over the week, Dad had sent down my king single swag from home, and I had camped in it so many times, I was used to sleeping on the ground, staying comfortable and dry, so I had all that I needed. I did go and do a little bit of clothes shopping, getting some new work trousers, long sleeve shirts and a couple of jackets, as it can get cold on the island, as I discovered with my unexpected overnight stay there, plus I bought a IPod, so I can listen to music during the quiet times.

When the day finally arrived that we would be setting off on our two week long research expedition, we gathered in the car park with our luggage and beds, which were loaded into the trailer attached to the back of the bus. By now we had been allocated who would be sharing bedrooms, with Auggie and a Vet Science class mate, Joseph Atkins, who I barely knew, sharing one room.

By the time the bus departed, I realised that I hadn’t seen Joseph board the bus, which was a bit of a surprise, as he is always punctual for lectures. “If I can have your attention please, we have two absentees, so two bedrooms will only have two per room, with J. Atkins and O. Davies not coming due to illness, and that will make two less for the Zoology team,” the professor announced to us.

Although it was suggested that we not bring any electronic devices, as there will be no mobile or internet services from the island, I brought my laptop computer, IPod and the sat phone with me, with the sat phone for emergency use only.

The journey south was long and tiring, but I did manage to snooze for part of the way, and when we finally arrived in Albany shortly after 1 pm, with us having a early lunch two hours earlier, at our one comfort stop, we were all glad to get out of the bus and stretch.

My mobile beeped with a message, so I had a quick look. “Jexon, steel platform and stairs in place, but cargo lift has not been installed. Have a good time on the island. Love, Dad.” I smiled after reading the message as I turned off my phone and hid it away, and we began to unload our luggage from the trailer, as a man from one of the bigger jetties approached our group.

“Professor Quinn? I am the skipper of the boat that will be taking you to Eclipse Island, my name is Mack Harcourt,” the man said as he shook the professor’s hand, and when he saw me, he frowned, then looked back to the professor.

“You are in some luck, the island now has a proper mooring platform, that was just finished yesterday, so getting onto the island will be a lot easier, mind you there are 9 metres of stairs to climb, which is about three levels,” the skipper stated.

“Oh, well that is an unexpected surprise, sounds like the island has been getting a lot of attention lately,” Professor Quinn stated. “Yes, the Department has some benefactor who had been helping finance the improvements,” the skipper said as he led the way down to the jetty with all of us following.

“Have all the supplies that we ordered arrive?” Dr De Souza asked the skipper, “That it did, they left just a few minutes ago, and it is all onboard,” the skipper replied. “How far is it from here to Eclipse Island?” one of the Marine Biology students asked, “That would be 17 nautical miles or 31 ½ kilometres, and it will take us an hour and a half to get there, at a cruise speed of 12 knots,” the skipper replied.

A lot of the group including two of the lecturers were seasick for most of the journey including Auggie, but surprisingly I was not affected, and I wondered if it was because I was a pilot, and had done plenty of barrel rolls, that made me safe from the sickness, as the boat rocked from side to side for most of the trip, once out in the open ocean in Frenchman Bay.

When we arrived at the island, I got to see the newest part of the project for the first time, and it looked extremely solid, as the people who were not stricken my seasickness, helped with carting all of the food supplies up to the top, and from there it was just a 200 metre walk to the house, where Professor Quinn unlocked the doors to the two accommodation areas.